


and i wake up, and i wake up

by despairingdignities



Category: Broadchurch
Genre: F/F, F/M, au based on if beth was the one obsessed with justice rather than mark
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-24
Updated: 2017-08-24
Packaged: 2018-12-19 12:00:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11897313
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/despairingdignities/pseuds/despairingdignities
Summary: and you're still dead.AU that imagines if Beth as opposed to Mark is the one obsessed with justice after the trial. Title from Richard Siken poetry.





	and i wake up, and i wake up

_“D’ya know how many knives there are in here? Fourteen. I counted ‘em while I was waiting. Thought about which’d be best to use on you. We could kill you in ‘ere, dump your body on a beach, and no-one’d care. No-one’d notice. But we’re more than you. We - I - will not be broken by this.”_

That was what Beth Latimer had said that day, in the hut where her son had died, where he had died scared and alone at the hands of Joe Miller. And she had sat across from that man, perched on her shaking hands, with Ellie and Mark at either side of her for caution.

Beth had thought then that she had told the truth, but as time stretches endlessly in front of her, the longer the guilt of having failed her only son wounds her and bears down on her shoulders, the more she begins to think that perhaps, some of those words were lies.

Every crashing wave of guilt makes new cracks in the dam she had built up to protect herself; and through each crack, like a wound, bitter thoughts bleed through into the forefront of her mind when she lays awake at night. Thoughts about how she should have taken the smallest knife in the hut and put Joe Miller through the long, torturous pain she had been experiencing since day one.

It had been Paul that had prevented her doing it anyway, that night. It had been Paul that convinced her not to take a knife to Joe Miller’s throat. Or her hands, for that matter. She’s been tempted by the idea, many a time after the nightmarish trial and the result that has not satisfied her desperate need for closure.

Staring at her hands in the half-light made by the bedside lamp, Beth has often laid here alone, imagining the kind of sadistic sense of justice you might get from choking your son’s killer with your bare hands.

Not guilty. She knows he did it. She saw it in his eyes as he looked at her in the hut.

Mark had never liked the lamps on while he slept. They kept him awake; but since he has left Beth alone just like everyone else, she only has the lamp, her hands, and the small pale circle on her left hand where the sign of her wedding vows had once rested.

Yes, she essentially forced Mark out, unable to bear the half-hearted shadow of what they had once called love, but all the same he had accepted that. He had barely put up a fight in an attempt to keep the young, skinny love that had begun when Beth was fifteen.

She is no longer fifteen, no longer so innocent and naïve. The smiles she gives are tired, half-hearted and they never reach her eyes. Her face is drawn with the lines of grief that define someone who had seen such pain. There is no questioning it. The girl with the sunshine grin, whose green eyes sparkled with mirth and whose laughter was like notes on a piano, is gone. The Beth he had fallen in love with is gone, and here instead is the ghost of that girl, the Beth who Mark has left behind.

Mark is gone. Danny is gone, dead, and her mother too; without the presence of all three, the Latimer house constantly feels empty. The day that Chloe moves out and leaves Beth with just Lizzie is fast approaching. Broadchurch and its familiarity can be nearly unbearable at times, with the flashbacks and all the people’s sympathetic looks to the point she's considered moving. But it wouldn’t change anything, she knows that. No matter what, it will always be their house. The dead boy’s house. Even on the day when the papers are finalised and she isn’t even a Latimer anymore, they’d remember. And while that’s just what Danny’s memory deserves, it’s no good for Beth.

She can close her eyes, act it in her head then and there, hear the words. ‘Are you the new people who moved into the ol’ Latimer house? Tragedy, that boy, an’ the mother and father’s marriage just couldn’t hold on. Been years now, but everyone still remembers Mark an’ Beth.”

Joe’s eyes flash onto the back of her eyelids and she jolts upwards, breathing heavily. _No._

Back to reality. Or, at least, things that she thinks are real. Sometimes, with the strange dreams the sleep meds bring on, she can’t be sure. On the rare occasion that Mark visits, she’ll ask him to help her unravel truth from fantasy, because she can’t help but feel she’s losing her grip. Night after night she’ll dream of Danny, and reach out to hold him but he’ll dissipate into the background – she’ll wake up, and he’ll still be dead.

“I want to kill him, El,” she’d whispered to the friend who she had hated in vain for so long, “I wouldn’t hesitate for a second, just give me the chance…” Joe. She’d do it, if she saw him again, see him dead and buried. Maybe not even buried. He didn’t deserve that dignity.

 _Ellie_.

Beth has managed to push Mark away with her war of words and bitter accusations. She is good at that, pushing those who try to help her away, but she’s never managed to make Ellie give up on her. Stubborn bitch.

Even when Beth had hurled abuse at Ellie, and physically shoved her away to boot, her closest friend had always been annoyingly persistent. Nights of staggering across the field together, giggling and drunk, had turned into a bitter Beth angry at herself for needing Ellie’s support to get home before the birth.

_‘I don’t want you here.’ ‘Well, tough shit!’_

She laughs aloud at the thought, and because the place is so empty, it seems to echo.

And she feels so incredibly lonely. She’s an outdoor soul, everyone in Broadchurch knows that. People have been getting worried about her, closing in on herself and doing less and less as she loses the motivation to even move. Ellie will get her out whenever she can, prying Beth from the sofa and saying they’re going somewhere. But she’s a busy woman, and when she’s not working, she’s often out with D.I. Hardy.

(Beth’s happy for them. It seems to work. They say they’re not dating, but you can’t fool a fooler, and you certainly can’t fool Beth Latimer.)

She turns over to look at the clock. It’s stopped again, like it did that night, and she can’t explain why her blood runs cold just for a moment. Is Ellie on nights this week? Beth thinks she is, and she needs someone to talk to. Anything but this god-awful silence.

Mark doesn’t pick up anymore.

It rings for some time before Ellie picks it up, but it’s the gruff voice of Hardy that she hears.

“Who’s this?”

“Beth,” she replies, and her voice is suddenly thick and she hates that. “Doesn’t it say that on the Caller ID?”

He made a non-committal noise. “Yes, it probably did. _Miller_! Mrs. Latimer’s on the phone for you!”

Beth smiles. He still calls her Miller. But she frowns again shortly afterwards. “It’s Beth, please. I won’t be a Latimer for much longer, anyway, so you might as well get used to it.”

“Beth. Is that short for something?”

“Elizabeth,” she says. “But don’t go calling me that, either.”

It’s a relief when Ellie takes the phone. “Beth. Sorry about Alec, he’s a bit…terse tonight. Are you okay?”

“Yeah, fine.” Standard response.

“You’re not.”

Beth sighs resignedly through her nose. “No, I’m not.”


End file.
